Kenneth Rijock

Monday, August 17, 2015

DO NOT ACCEPT PASSPORTS FROM LIBERLAND, A NEW MICROSTATE

The Free Republic of Liberland, the creation of a Czech national, theoretically exists in a small, uninhabited, and disputed, piece of territory on the Danube, lying between Serbia and Croatia. Considering that a large number of individuals have already sent in applications for citizenship, expect that some enterprising money launderer, or adviser to narco-traffickers, will soon have a passport from that micro-state, which is actually not a state at all.

Should you encounter clients presenting any forms of identification asserting that that they are from the Free Republic of Liberland, know that it has not been recognized by any country, and is a non-entity for customer identification purposes. You might want to alert the members of your compliance team to tell those New Accounts people at your bank (the ones who were not paying attention in Geography class) not to accept them at account opening.